20 tips for artists for a good website
Designing a good website seems to require an endless list of tasks: organizing and selecting materials, photographing the artwork, writing a biography, an artist statement, and an up-to-date resume. You need to decide how to display your materials, what color combination will look best with your art, what fonts will complement your work…and more!
Do not give up! I have compiled 20 important points that artists should keep in mind when designing their website. Keep these guidelines as checkpoints during the creation of your site, or to check and improve an existing site.
1. keep it simple. Do not try to put all the information about your career or show every piece of art you have created. Choose relevant information that will keep the site simple and elegant. Try and include materials that reinforce the purpose of your site (is it to sell works? Attract new collectors? Or introduce a portfolio to galleries?).
2. Keep your file size low. People visiting your site don’t necessarily have a high-speed Internet connection, so keep in mind that too many images or too many large files can slow down a site significantly. Remember that many people will not wait for a site to load! Keep your jpg’s at 72dpi and try not to have images larger than 540px in any direction. You can also try to minimize the number of large files (music and video are usually very large) on any given page.
3. Keep your navigation simple. Don’t try to have too many categories or too many layers in your navigation system. Keep the placement of your navigation buttons consistent: If you choose to have your links on the left side, keep them there throughout the site and don’t change the order of your buttons from page to page.
Four. Have your own domain name. If your goal is to impress galleries and collectors, make sure they know you take your art seriously – your own domain name looks more professional, may be easier to remember, and may be more search engine friendly! Registering a domain has become quite affordable: typically $10-$15 per year with hosting costs between $5-$15 per month.
5. No page under construction. If you haven’t finished creating a page, don’t link to your site. People’s time is precious: don’t waste it announcing a category…then leave that category blank!
6. Featured Contact Information. Your site is a marketing tool: you can get potential collectors and galleries to discover your work. Make sure they know how to reach you when they fall in love with your art!
7. Label all illustrations. The images on the internet give no sense of scale or medium; therefore, it is extremely important to label each piece of art with the dimensions and materials used to make the work. Labeling your pieces with their price can be valuable if your goal is to sell online.
8. Include a short statement of art and resume. Please note that the text is difficult to read on the screen. As an artist, you should include an art statement and resume (people want to know about you), but keep it short. A few paragraphs for an art statement and 1-2 typed pages for a resume. If you must have a complete resume, give the viewer the option to print the document in pdf format.
9. Keep your text simple. Sans serif fonts like Arial are easier to read on the screen. Do not abuse the bold and italics, as they make the text difficult to read and can be confusing.
10 Avoid underlined text. Underlined text is generally reserved to indicate a link – avoid using underlined text other than a link to avoid confusion and frustration.
eleven Keep your color scheme subdued. Don’t blind your viewers! Avoid a bright yellow background with red text! Bright colors can be hard to see on a screen, especially for text. Keep your color scheme with low saturation colors
12 Avoid background image. Background images can slow down your site and unless done correctly will look tiled and unprofessional. Background images also tend to make the text difficult to read.
13 Avoid background music. Although it can be tempting to have music on a site, I have to advise against it for a number of reasons: your viewers may not share your taste in music, the music files are large and therefore take time to download, and lastly, even if your viewers like your music, it can be annoying to hear the same song every visit.
14 No cheesy mouse animation. This one is pretty obvious: it will annoy the vast majority of Internet users. Your goal is to make people like your site: don’t drive them away with annoying tricks!
fifteen. Do not disable the back button. Some sites try to keep their audience captive by disabling the back button. It’s hateful! Do not do it!
sixteen. Chorus for using frames and flash. Both of these coding methods tend to be hostile to search engines, so use them sparingly and include them with some good old HTML code.
17 Make sure your site is compatible with all browsers. There are no applicable rules for website coding, just generally accepted guidelines, so browsers tend to display the same code in slightly different ways. Therefore, it is important to test and view your site in several different browsers and screens to ensure that your site looks good for the majority of users.
18 Check that all your links work. Not only is it annoying for the user, but you can also risk losing your site’s ranking in search engines, or worse, not being indexed at all!
19 Open all external links in a new window. It’s good to give your visitors additional information by providing useful links, but make sure your own site stays on their screen by opening all external links in a new browser window.
twenty Maintain an honest relationship with your gallery.. Galleries cannot prevent you from selling works on the Internet. However, you must maintain a good working relationship with your gallery. Make sure you both understand who gets and doesn’t get a commission from internet sales. For example, if your gallery sells works on your site, or you sell works on your site that are currently in your space, they should receive the commission.